PRESIDENT VETOES PUBLIC JOBS BILL

WASHINGTON, Feb. 13— President Ford vetoed today a $6.2 billion measure to create jobs in state and local public works programs, charging that the legislation was “an election year pork barrel” that would do more harm than good.

The veto, Mr. Ford's 46th since taking office, may be challenged as early as next Thursday. Democratic leaders in Congress have expressed confidence that it can be overridden.

Representative Thomas P O'Neill of Massachusetts, the House majority leader, called the veto “another deplorable example of President Ford's disdain for the nation's unemployed.”

The House voted for the bill last month by a margin of 321 to 80, far more than the two‐thirds needed to override a veto. Earlier, the Senate passed the measure by voice vote.

The President said that contentions that the legislation would create 600,000 to 800,000 jobs were “badly exaggerated.” The Administration estimates, he said, indicate that at most 250,000 new jobs would be created. Moreover the jobs would be created over a period of several years, not now when they are needed, he said.

“The truth is that this bill would do little to create jobs for the unemployed,” Mr. Ford declared. “Moreover, the bill has so many deficiencies and undesirable provisions that it would do more harm than good. While it is represented as the solution to our unemployment problems, in fact it is little more than an election year pork barrel.”

Last month the unemployment rate fell sharply from 8.3 percent to 7.8 percent of the work force. However, there were still 7.3 million jobless Americans and the Administration's own forecasts project a high level of unemployment for years.

The public works bill is one effort by Congress to deal with the unemployment problem by creating jobs. The measure would provide funds for states and localities to use for accelerated public works construction or repair—such things as parks, sewer systems, public buildings. Areas with higher‐than‐ average unemployment would get most of the funds, and the funds would have to be expended within specified time periods.

For states and cities where unemployment is high, the bill also would provide “countercyclical financial help in the form of revenue‐sharing grants. This direct cash assistance could be used as the recipients saw fit.

The public works approach is antithetical to President Fords belief that the Government should play as small a role as possible in the economy.

“The best and most effective way to create new jobs,” Mr. Ford said, “is to pursue balanced economic policies that encourage the growth of the private sector without risking a new round of inflation.”

In addition to charges that contentions for the bill were exaggerated, Mr. Ford made the following other objections to the legislation

¶Costs of creating jobs would be “intolerably high, perhaps in excess of $25,000 per job.”

¶lobs would not be created in the immediate future when they are needed but in late 1977 and early 1978.

¶The counter — cyclical aid would give preferential treatment to units of Government with the highest taxes.

¶It would be “almost impossible to assure taxpayers that these dollars are being responsibly and effectively spent”

¶lt would create a new urban renewal program almost identical with the one that Congress had already replaced with a different, more flexible plan

The veto evoked sharply critical reaction from Democratic members of Congress, labor leaders and others shortly after it was exercised by President Ford this morning.

Representative Bella S. Abzug, Democrat of Manhattan, who worked on the legislation, said that the veto constituted “a nonjobs policy of a nonelected President and said that the bill represented “a new and creative antirecession program.”

George Meany, President of the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations, said that the bill “would contribute substantially to putting America back to work “

“The President's short‐sighted and politically inspired veto must be overriden,” he said.

Officials at the White House concede that the veto might not be sustained. “We'll give it a battle, but the numbers are against us,” said one of the President's legislative assistants.

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A version of this archives appears in print on February 14, 1976, on Page 1 of the New York edition with the headline: PRESIDENT VETOES PUBLIC JOBS BILL. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe